Politico reports on speculation that Eva Moskowitz is high up on the Trump list as a potential Secretary of Education.
Hedge fund manager John Paulson gave Moskowitz $8.5 million for her charter chain. He was also a major supporter of Trump.
Would she want to leave her charter empire, where she is paid handsomely? As Secretary of Education, she could spread the gospel of privatization far and wide.
While Moskowitz has found herself on the defensive at home, Success is still seen as a national charter model by many influential reform leaders. That’s based in large part on loyal, vocal support for her from the families of her student body, which is overwhelmingly poor, black and Latino — groups among whom opposition to Trump in the election was particularly strong.
(Success staff seemed to be mourning the results last week; the network’s social media staff posted a Langston Hughes poem about equality in America on its Twitter feed the morning after the election.)
Politics aside, Moskowitz might chafe at the constraints of the post, which is viewed among education observers largely as a bureaucratic position without all the power the title would suggest. This would be particularly true if a Trump administration set about relinquishing some federal power back to the states.
And while Trump has pledged to “get rid of” the Common Core, Moskowitz is a strong supporter of the set of standards introduced by President Obama. An enormous part of her schools’ renown is Success students’ high scores on Common Core-aligned exams.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Reblogged this on DelawareFirstState and commented:
Our educational system is once again up in the air, very concerned.
What are the thoughts on what this might mean for teacher licensure and the fate of public schools in general?
There is no way for the federal government to affect teacher licensure. Anybody who is saying different is just plain wrong.
If you poll even very conservative people and ask them “do you want teachers who are not licensed to teach school?” they will almost uniformly say that they do. Most people are shocked by the notion that the state would not regulate who is in front of school children.
Quick correction:
“. . . and ask them “do you want teachers who are not licensed to teach school?” they will almost uniformly say that they doN’T.”
I doubt she’d heed any constraints. Plus, she’d have a bigger playground with shiny new playthings like Pence’s Made In Indiana voucher system. I think it’s safe to say that Indiana under Pence is sort of a pilot program for Trump/Pence. Here are my thoughts: http://www.psconnectnow.org/blog/2016/11/14/its-over
I have a strong feeling the Breitbart post was typical propaganda. We are supposed to believe that Trump’s voters — the ones who had no problem with his racism, sexism and xenophobia – would object to Eva Moskowitz’ appointment. In fact, I have never seen any evidence that the alt right has anything but love for Ms. Moskowitz.
But I look forward to the Success Academy parents starting their “Trump is really a good man” PR effort.
I look forward to the woman who claims that a shocking number of 5 and 6 year olds regularly do violent things worthy of suspending them from school justifying taking a position in the cabinet of President-elect Donald “I never apologize for any lies” Trump.
I look forward to her explaining to the parents and children in her schools that Donald Trump’s 5 year effort to convince the American people that Barack Obama was an illegitimate President who lied about his birth certificate and was born in Kenya is not something he needs to apologize for. After all “Hillary started it” and that’s good enough for her.
I mean, it’s not as if President-elect Trump couldn’t come up with a proper answer to a test question! That’s the kind of thing a kid needs to be punished for. But lying about a President to appeal to racists by telling them their President was born in Kenya and isn’t a “real American”? Nope, no apology necessary for that!
I’m looking forward to hearing the Success Academy parents parroting their new lines: “Donald Trump is great. We must respect our great leader President Trump. He cares so much about poor kids.”
And who cares if he’s been calling Obama a liar and illegitimate President for the last 5 years. Will any Success Academy parents if Eva Moskowitz tells them it was just a little joke?
I do not know if my thoughts count for very much, but the problem remains with the democrats. Hillary will speak tonight and will probably point out that she won the popular vote….which…..in reality, she did not. Her margin in just two states, New York and Massachusetts is more than twice her deficit to Trump in the other 48. She had huge margins in those two states, riding on the coattails of teachers who racked up 60 percent of the vote to deal effectively in stopping the aggression of the charter interests.
No one in the press has mentioned anything about the blunder by Obama…affecting election results in 2014 and 2016 in turning over so much power to Bill Gates and Arne Duncan.. No one in the press ever mentions the extent to which this has demoralized teachers….while they still probably voted for Hillary…..it was half-hearted…if it had been with the raging intensity that it was in New York and Massachusetts, Hillary would have won by a huge margin. If teachers had turned out in the numbers to which the democrat big shots have learned to take for granted, she would have won in numbers greater than were expected.
Democrats are not all that special to teachers any more. Cue up BB king. The thrill is gone.
What do you mean “in reality” Hillary did not win the popular vote?
What “reality” do you live in where “winning the popular vote” excludes all voters in New York and Massachusetts above some number?
That’s like saying “in reality, Trump didn’t win”. Because he racked up most of his wins in the most sparsely populated states where each person’s vote counted more than those voters in NY and California.
That’s like saying “in reality, Trump didn’t win” because in some of the right wing Republican states where he racked up his highest popular vote totals, there was a concerted effort to suppress the votes of minorities by taking away voting places.
Not agreeing with his assertions , However the 600, 000 NYSUT members should have been able to send Cuomo packing in the primary .
Joel, I’m not sure what your point is.
Why did Cuomo win the primary? He had a nice challenger on the left and apparently all those working class white Democrats upstate still preferred the DINO.
Is there a way to blame Hillary for that, too?
I think you may have your geographical demography backwards.
Teachout won upstate,,those traditionally conservative areas, BIGLY !!!!!!!
But you are simply amazing . My point was that ,it was a colossal failure on the part of the NYSUT with a membership that large to not be able to swing that low turnout primary.
But now that you want to bring this up .Look who Hillary lost to. Look where she lost . She was a pathetically weak candidate who was lucky her Republican opponent was as flawed as he was or she might have lost “Mass and NY” as well
Yes it was the right wing slime machine that caused all of those democrats in those Traditionally Blue states, to stay home. Wake up and smell the roses only 13 state legislatures/ Governorship’s are Democratic. The industrial Midwest turning Red is on the Clinton’s.
from UPI: WASHINGTON, Nov. 16 (UPI) — Hillary Clinton’s popular vote lead over President-elect Donald Trump has surpassed 1 million, according to an independent analysis.
Cook Political Report on Wednesday said Clinton had 62,403,469 votes compared to Trump’s 61,242,652 votes.
According to some, that lead doesn’t count because it includes voters from NY and Massachusetts.
The Democrats already have Chuck Schumer as their speaker. . . . They never change. More of the same worn out neo-liberal, monied governance that will focus more an identity politics than on fiscal and economic justice. It’s not that identity politics are not critical; they are!!!! But they are but part of the picture. Those parts of the picture continued to be ignored by Chuck Schumer and people like him.
Until the Democrats really want to look at themselves and do what you Americans refer to as “soul searching”, nothing will change. In Norway, we say “Hva er i veien?” which literally translates as “What’s in the way” but it really means “Just what exactly is wrong or chasing this problem?”
Bernie should break away and just create a third party. It is a perfect storm to do so.
You’re too used to your parliamentary democracy. Third parties right back to the progressive Bull Moose party of Teddy Roosevelt have not fared well.
Yes nothing may say Wall Street more than Chuck Schumer, yet he may be the only moderating influence to deal!!! with the right wing influence of Ryan and Pence.
Oh god
yes…demoralized…Obama was generally a good president except for one sector…education…
Was he good for punishing and addressing Wall Street and scrutinizing the TARP funds?
Was he good in making sure the ACA REALLY addressed insurance costs?
Did he robustly address the police killings of many an unarmed black youth?
And Obama’s love affair with the TPP, which allows countries like mine to come in and sue your country and companies if we feel that our trade deals were not profitable enough after signing a contract . . . My country (in actuality, Trans-Pacific countries), for example, selling 20 million dollars of smoked salmon to your country and its vendors . . . and YOU, the American taxpayer, get to bail out my Norwegian company with your tax dollar, all without ever having to go to a court of law. That’s Obama’s love of corporations. And the TPP’s draconian affect upon Medicare?
Obama “generally good” as you stated? Sounds like America has sought mediocrity as its highest level of expression in Obama. But this won’t be the first time that this dynamic has arisen.
Ask Cornell West.
This article from Feb in HuffPo stands up to how Trump snatched victory from HRC in the rust belt.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/how-donald-trump-becomes-president_us_56cb5429e4b0928f5a6c9ead
Trump was unequivocally opposed trade policies that have decimated workers for 40 years. The Democrat’s message of education as the path to economic security sunk like a rock with these people. Dems further undermined their own message and spent 8 years denigrating the very public ed system & its teachers that they claimed will lead everyone to the promised land of employment. Many of those white, blue collar folks sent their kids to college and their kids now live at home or work at Starbucks paying off college debt.
In the end, these people & their children had no real Democratic party to turn to.
Worse yet, in June Obama was stumping in Ohio for the TPP. I thought at the time are the Dems TRYING to give Ohio to the Republicans? Turns out they did just that. I don’t think tone deaf is a strong enough metaphor to explain the depth of their failure.
Unbelievable.
Well, of course, the Non-Education Secretary for the Non-Department of Education.
Moskowitz doesn’t believe in education, only training. That’s the truth of it. She doesn’t believe in pedagogy, education theory or research, just training and discipline and content knowledge. That’s it. What a perfect fit for a disappearing department.
This is not the end, though. Just a new kind of beginning. For both education and the nation. Education will not disappear in the convoluted entrails of industry, and our country will not go to hell down a Disneyland water ride. The reaction to this election is — and this will ultimately become obvious — the greater force.
Across the aisle- Ilyse Hogue is the third candidate, discussed for DNC leadership. The first, Howard Dean, met with DFER while teachers protested outside in the rain. The second, Rep. Keith Ellison, introduced legislation last year that facilitated financing for charter schools. What is Hogue’s position on the Gates/Walton scheme to privatize America’s most important common good?
Other names in the running for DNC chair-Henry Munoz III and the former member of Podesto Group “talent”, Jaime Harrison.
Every time the Dems pointed to the fact that they had a lead in the polls Trump or Kelly Ann Conway pointed to the size of Trump’s crowds, intensity. In the end they were right. Bernie had intensity and could have beaten Trump. Clinton did not have intensity. As a result, her vote in Milwaukee and Detroit for example could not bother voting and cost her the election.
Doug,
Hillary won 3 million votes more than Bernie in the primaries. You can’t be the Democratic candidate unless you win the primaries first. Crowds don’t win primaries.
Despite the size and intensity of Trump’s crowds, he lost the popular vote by one million voters.
I still don’t understand why people believe voters who just re-elected Ron Johnson over Russ Feingold were ever going to turn against Trump.
The voters who re-elected right winger Pat Toomey again weren’t going to be swayed by Bernie’s economic appeal. He was obviously far too liberal, and the general election campaign wasn’t going to sway voters who thought Pat Toomey did a great job as Senator and let’s re-elect him to do more of it.
The way to win was for Democrats to get the voters that didn’t bother to come out after the constant drumbeat of how corrupt Hillary was.
If Russ Feingold couldn’t even manage even as many votes as Hillary Clinton in Wisconsin, what makes you think Bernie could?
Those white voters loved their right wing Senators. They could have had Bernie’s liberal promises from a non-practicing socialist Jew, or Bernie’s liberal promises from Trump along with that nice evangelical Christian agenda.
Hindsight is not 20/20.
Let’s see – Eva or Rhee ? …after Arne, what is there to lose ?
You are right. When you look at what we’ve already had, in fine detail, you realize that it couldn’t get much worse than Arne Duncan.
” An enormous part of her schools’ renown is Success students’ high scores on Common Core-aligned exams.”
Dear God … and they might make this woman Education Secretary? What a tragedy if all American students started getting high scores on exams.
She gets those high scores by repeatedly suspending the problem kids until the parents get so fed up and take the child back to the real public schools. It’s called attrition and churn. One of the tricks of the trade of charter schools: counseling out the problem kids who lower scores.
I think any Trump Administration would align very well with the notion that there’s no point in wasting public funding to teach the students who aren’t going to get high scores on exams.
doug1943, if you exclude the kids who might get low scores, and push out the kids who do get low scores, you solve the problem of scores. All you are left with—if you winnow enough–is the kids who get high scores.
Poor children will not suddenly score well on standardized tests, if Eva would no longer be in control of who takes the tests. It’s not possible.
“What a tragedy if all American students started getting high scores on exams.”
You are quite correct in stating this as I didn’t detect a facetious or sarcasm font.
Shall we have a discussion on why your statement is true?? Let me know!! TIA, Duane
Of course, one of the President-Elect’s signature lines is “You’re fired!”
So, in a way, that would make perfect sense -hiring a Secretary of Education with the same mentality. That’s what so many of these charter schools seem to have been doing, just firing kids in a way. Got a learning disability…you’re fired. Can’t hack the prison-like conditions…you’re fired!
But you know, stocks in private prisons have shot up since Trump won the election. So, there will be plenty of room for kids in the soon to be expanded school to prison pipeline. Welcome to Trump World. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-11-09/private-prison-stocks-are-surging-after-trump-s-win
Also, see the ACLU https://www.aclu.org/issues/juvenile-justice/school-prison-pipeline
Sick. Sick and shameless.
If Trump is serious about pushing vouchers, it’s less likely he’d choose Moskowitz, and less likely she’d accept, since vouchers would have a negative effect on her charter empire.
Assuming that funding for education does not increase appreciably in the next four years, vouchers are a threat to charter schools, since the Repugs will have given up any pretense of supporting “public” schools of any kind, charter or otherwise.
It might even result in some strange political bedfellows in the coming years, unless the decision made is to completely eliminate real public schools entirely.
Now there’s a thought…
Vouchers aren’t a threat to charter schools – at least not Eva Moskowitz’ charter chain.
Vouchers aren’t going to cover expensive private school tuition. They will provide a small subsidy to the affluent parents who can pay the bulk of the tuition themselves.
The middle class parents and low-income strivers will still need charters — the “free” private school. And charters will still need to stack the deck to make their schools more appealing than underfunded publics. Aside from starving public education of funding, making sure there is no pesky oversight that would prevent charters from shedding expensive and low scoring students helps them stack the deck against publics, who are obligated to accept all charter dropouts.
You are mistaken: vouchers most certainly can and will be used to send students to Parochial and Christian schools, and unless overall funding is raised, charters will suffer negative impacts.
http://www.freep.com/story/news/education/2016/11/16/betsy-devos-education-secretary-trump/93973224/
Multiple sources report that Betsy DeVos, Michigan charter school advocate and wife of Amway’s Dick DeVos, is under consideration to become the new Secretary of Education.
God forbid.
Oh Lord. 😦
Standard class warfare: the wishes and ambitions of a few wealthy elites vs. the everyday person just trying to live their life. At stake, everything that has been in American political history: money. Where is it coming from and then going to? Who benefits? At the expense of whom? Fight people. The largely democratic party push for privatization will pale in comparison as passive-aggressive to what the business-n-billioinaire-backed republicans will do. If we’re going down and out, let’s finish the game. I’m ready.
Obama is one of many masterminds of school privatization and choice. This is no longer a Democrat vs. Republican sort of thing. The fish rots and reeks from the head.
Agreed, wholeheartedly. There’s only one politics: political economy, better known as Economics.
Yossarian: We are about to engage in a war on economics that we have never seen before. It will be the 1% and most of the government against everyone else.
Yossarian
The definition I was given in 1972 in my first Political Science Course.
Economics is who gets what.
Politics is who decides who gets what.
An exquisitely simple explanation from Harold Laswell in 1936
Ben Carson, the creationist climate-change-denier, looks like a great choice by comparison…
. . . for having brain surgery!
He did say he wouldn’t appoint an educator.
Considering the state of GAGA Good German teachers and adminimals, maybe that’s not a bad idea.
First, up to joe prichard: I saw a portion of Hillary’s speech (it was at a Children’s Defense Fund Event) and, no, she did not mention the election numbers. From what I saw/heard, she was very gracious, and she talked about America.
Secondly, as to the Democratic primaries–I’m sorry, but there is evidence of election fraud, and in more than one state. Lawsuits have been filed in Chicago, NY & CA. Ironically, the same situation that occurred in the CA primary (all votes not counted for days, yet a winner declared {& by AP–the NIGHT BEFORE the actual election day!}} also occurred (or is still occurring) w/regard to Hillary’s votes (she has even more than previously reported, & may yet have more). Also–it was reported from Ohio–that someone working at certain polling places had turned off the safeguard apparatus on the voting machines. Just this week, Chicago area citizens (you all can do this in your cities/counties, etc. if you are registered voters) are monitoring a Board of Elections audit post-general elections. (This is how election irregularities were found in the Democratic primary–hence, a requested audit by an independent company {completed, & finding of at least 13 gap areas; the report is available to the public–if any of you are from Chicago, ask, & I will post the link}, as well as a pending lawsuit.) Please note, I’m not talking about VOTER fraud, here (which has been noted to be rare)–I am describing ELECTION fraud–which has, historically, been widespread in numerous past elections, & both on Republican & Democrat sides.
Finally–Norwegian Filmmaker–you are so right about so much of what you say. In fact, tonight, a newscaster (not msm!) brought up the possibility that Obama’s pushing of the TPP most likely really hurt Hillary. & all of us asked WHY he was, indeed, pushing such a toxic trade agreement. IMO, his legacy is Arne Duncan & John King & causing death rattles within the realm of public education.
As to the last, we will continue to fight for OUR schools!